I'm a bit surprised to see GG fingered as one of the driving causes of the ongoing poverty in WP. I always viewed them as more of a bystanding support group. I rent to one of their employees and have met Randy, the lead guy, a few times. I go in there quite a bit to collect rent. My thought was when GG moved from Harrison West, it was viewed as a successful milestone that thier work was done in HW and that they were now going to focus on WP. While they have a much larger facility in WP, I've always assumed they would be ready to move on to another poverty hotspot when the need for them in WP was exhaused. There are plenty of neighborhoods needing their kinds of services.
As for the WP Community Plan, my impression was that if left to the guys driving the plan, (mostly the former head of the WP Civic Association, but possibly Randy at GG, and even Campus Partners), that the stated mission was to not displace any of the existing residents of the neighborhood. It was very anti-gentrification and pro "neighborhood empowerment". The idea was grow the neighborhood from the inside. My thought was, while admirable, that approach is not so realisitic (haven't we tried this approach since LBJ was president?). I personally sent comments on the draft plan to the city planning department managing the production of the final version. I strongly encouraged that the plan provide for some amount of gentrification in the mission, which was added. But isn't the plan just a document? I'd like to think that market forces can drive change.
Gentrification is needed to really turn the neighborhood. I see gentrification starting to take root. I think the neighborhood is finally starting to go somewhere, although there's a lot to get done. Unlike many other similar low-income neighborhoods in the city (e.g. Linden, Hilltop, the near eastside), WP seems ideally positioned to gentrify. Wagonbrenner developments of the CCF and Ault/3M sites will really help things move along. Unlike, say Victorian Village, the neighborhood cannot and will not gentrity completely, because of the significant fraction of longterm CPO housing. But I anticipate that all of the privately-held Section 8 housing will gradually convert to non-subsidized, including most or all of the larger multi-units now occupied by factions such as tenants subsizide by the mental-health agencies. Some of those conversions have already happened.
As for my units, except for a few very low-key SSI-supported retirees, I am now able to rent to mostly young working individuals or couples, and a few OSU grad students. Eight years ago, I couldn't come close to finding any non-subsidized tenants unless they were drug trade entrepenuers or chronic deadbeats hopping from the last unit from which they were about to be set-out. It took me a long time to learn how to operate in this market, to rigorously screen tenants and find good tenants. But it's getting easier now!
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